When Love Burned Through The Draperies
When love burned through the draperies
My soul did start, ill-clad
I sat before the mirror
And found nought to make me glad
Still steeped in sleep and darkness
And hibernation's maw
I had no mind for visitors
When love rapped on the door.
A wreath of advent candles
I'd counted one to five
then shrank at celebration
with no worthy gift to give
The silence gathered round me
like snow upon a tomb
I nursed a withered heart from grief
weaving yarns upon my loom.
The threads were bright as silver
outlining every cloud
The reds were warm as berries
and told not of blood that flowed
The blues belonged to April
The greens were plucked from May
while autumn's incandescence
was the richest irony.
I had no truck with winter
my windows fastened tight
my doors were lagged with sackcloth
my cinders warmed the night
The adamantine rime did glint
upon the stricken willow
Rain and gales vented spleen
but I clung to my pillow.
So little did I understand
cocooned within the womb
that heaven declared a rebirth
and all my senses dumb
would wake like Lazarus and dance
and all my mourning maim
when love seared through the draperies
and set the door aflame!
